Introducing long-form question answering

To help advance question answering (QA) and create smarter assistants, Facebook AI is sharing the first large-scale data set, code, and baseline models for long-form QA, which requires machines to provide long, complex answers -- something that existing algorithms have not been challenged to do before. Current systems are focused on trivia-type questions, like whether jellyfish have a brain. Our data set goes further by requiring machines to elaborate with in-depth answers to open-ended questions, such as "How do jellyfish function without a brain?" Furthermore, our data set provides researchers with hundreds of thousands of examples to advance AI models that can synthesize information from multiple sources and provide explanations to complex questions across a wide range of topics. For truly intelligent assistants that can help us with myriad daily tasks, AI should be able to answer a wide variety of questions from people beyond straightforward, factual queries such as "Which artist sings this song?"